It is the second time in a week that the Biden administration has indicated it will comply with a host country directive to remove deployment forces from an African country considered integral to US counterterrorism operations in the region. On Friday, officials said the United States had agreed to withdraw more than 1,000 troops from neighboring Niger.
The unrest in Chad is affecting fewer than 100 Army Special Forces soldiers stationed at the French base in N’Djamena, the capital. It was in a rotating semester that is being completed, according to one of the US officials. A small number of U.S. military personnel working with a regional joint task force focused on Lake Chad — where the extremist group Boko Haram and its affiliates operate — will remain in the country, this person said.
The official stressed that unlike Niger, Chad’s government has not canceled the “status of forces” agreement that governs its military relationship with the United States. Instead, the departure of the Special Forces troops, first reported by the New York Times, follows an apparent dispute between US officials and a Chadian general who claimed Washington had not produced documents justifying a military presence of N’Djamena and asked the Americans to “immediately cease” their activity at the base.
Those concerns, expressed by Idriss Amine Ahmed, a top general in Chad’s air force, were conveyed in a letter, not through traditional diplomatic channels, according to two U.S. officials. CNN first reported his letter last week. There has also been confusion about his intent, with some officials saying the Chadians appear to want more from the United States in terms of cooperation and others saying Chad’s wishes were unclear.
A spokesman for the Chadian government did not respond to requests for comment.
Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder, the Pentagon’s press secretary, said Thursday during a news conference that while talks with Chad continue, commanders “plan to redeploy some U.S. military forces.”
He described the shift as a “temporary step.”
“They are asking Western partners the question: ‘What’s in it for us?’ a Western official said of the Chadians. “And it’s not so bad for the West to think the same thing.”
The debate surrounding the US military presence in Chad – a vast landlocked nation in Central Africa – is particularly fraught given the rejection of Western military partnerships in the central Sahelian nations of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso.
The three former French colonies face escalating threats from Islamist extremist groups, are ruled by military juntas and are increasingly turning to Russia for military aid. The respective governments in each have in recent years demanded that French military forces, which have historically been the main international counter-terrorism partner, leave their countries.
The United States, which has had no security relationship with Mali or Burkina Faso since their coups, had maintained a presence in Niger, including a newly constructed drone base that cost $110 million to build.
While US security assistance was halted after Niger’s military seized power last summer, negotiations have continued, with the United States seeking to compel Niger to agree to a democratic transition. But a tense meeting last month prompted the junta to scrap the status-of-forces agreement and declare the US military presence “illegal”.
The junta spokesman said the US delegation tried to dictate that the West African nation has no relations with some other countries, including Iran and Russia.
Unlike in the central Sahel, Chad’s leader, General Mahamat Idriss Debi Itno, who rules from 2021, has not called for the French to leave. But he has cultivated ties with leaders in the central Sahel and with Russia, and some analysts say a French withdrawal is inevitable. Earlier this year, Déby went to Russia to meet with President Vladimir Putin, who said the two countries had “great opportunities to develop our bilateral ties.”
That meeting marked a change from just last year, when US intelligence officials warned that Russian mercenaries were working with rebels to topple Chad’s government, which was then seen as too pro-Western.
The Western official praised the work of the multinational task force to counter Boko Haram in the Lake Chad Basin, but said personnel in N’Djamena have seen their mission shrink because the region’s wave of coups has limited the types of military activities it can carry out. partner forces from Chad can do.
“It’s important to look at our strategic partnerships,” the official said, “to think about what purpose we’re serving.”
Maj. Todd R. Wasmund, who oversees a small no Military personnel in Chad and Niger said in an interview that the Sahel countries continue to want to work with the United States.
“But they also want us to respect them as sovereign nations,” he added. “So we both have to choose how to demonstrate commitment to shared values and shared goals.”
Lamothe and Hudson reported from Washington.